It would be difficult for the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) to craft a more perfect explanation. 15 elephants died tragically from ingesting tomatoes sprayed with cyanide based pesticide in the top tomato growing area of Kimana. It was accidental. It was an isolated incident. There was no danger to the public. It did not involve the poaching of elephants. It was not an issue of human-elephant conflict. It was a pesticide distribution issue. There was to be no KWS investigation. It was now in the hands of a multi-agency committee headed by the Pest Control Products Board.
End of story, no muss, no fuss. A story that made it into the bylines of hundreds of global news outlets over the course of four to five days could now rest. 15 (or perhaps 18) of the world’s favourite animal had not died at the hands of greedy criminals or vengeful farmers, but by simply being at the wrong place at the wrong time.
But is the KWS version the truth? Several ambiguities and contradictions presented themselves through the course of the reporting and the more credible and likely narrative did not present itself at all until the official version had been apparently accepted and buried.
In assessing veracity, one must first examine the character of the organisation making the statement. The KWS is internationally recognized as a wildlife authority of repute. Indeed, anyone who has visited Kenya’s parks will have undoubtably been impressed by the rangers deportment and professionalism. The organisation, however, has a challenge with communications relating to the accuracy of its efforts in combating wildlife crime or anything relating to a mis-deed or transgression by one of its members or management. Words like accountability and integrity are for organisational value statements and have no meaningful, actionable significance. KWS typically suffers the same affliction as its National Police Service cousins; ignore when you can, then deny, deny, deny, and when that fails, scape goat, minimize, or re-direct blame.
Some may remember what was referred to as the botched KWS rhino re-location project of 2018 when 11 rhinos died as the result of water salinity issues. It became ugly. Six senior KWS officers were suspended and the acting Director General, Julius Kimani, was demoted and replaced. Richard Leakey, who had recently ended his term as the Head of the KWS Board of Trustees, traded barbs publicly with Najib Balala, Cabinet Secretary of Tourism and Wildlife (and de-facto Director General of KWS) over who was a fault. In the end, while Minister Balala took much of the heat, he was able to deflect some responsibility onto the World Wildlife Fund (Kenya) for allegedly pressuring KWS into the rhino re-location. Oh yes, there may have been USD 1 million involved somewhere. One could speculate that KWS at the time would loved to have come up with the ‘accident’ hypothesis.
In a more recent case, KWS attempted to have an obvious murder of one of their own classified as a suicide. This past March, Corporal Leonard Ochieng Odero, a KWS ranger, was found shot in his Nakuru National Park accommodations. KWS attempted to report is death as a suicide, that he had shot himself six times with his issued semi-automatic rifle. Fortunately, family prevailed in having a post mortem examination that ruled the injuries (gun shot wounds to his head, back, and arm) as inconsistent with self-inflicted gun shot wounds. His death, now a murder investigation, occurred in the same national park where a local fisherman, 18 months previous, had became a victim of an “enforced disappearance” resulting in charges being laid against six KWS officers.
The bottom line here is that KWS and the truth are not typically compatible in circumstances where they may have some culpability.
The idea of the elephant deaths being classified as an accident merits some consideration. The definition of ‘accident’, includes phrases such as, ‘by chance’, by mistake, unexpected, not deliberate. In his last public statement on World Rangers Day, Director General of KWS, Professor Erastus Kanga, stated that they were unaware of exactly where the poisoned tomatoes had come from or who was responsible for cultivating such. It was surmised that the tomatoes came from a random, subsistence farmer (earlier reports had the tomatoes coming from a large commercialised operation). It begs the question then, if KWS did not know who planted the ‘cyanide tomatoes’ or their location, how could they ascertain that the elephant deaths were accidental? Bearing in mind that retribution killings of wildlife by farmers is not uncommon, to make the determination that these deaths were accidental would at the barest minimum require some type of investigation into the involved farmer.
There are other ambiguities. KWS stated that the elephant deaths occurred over a period between June 24th and July 24th in two different areas, the Kimana Sanctuary and Kuku Ranch. Kuku Ranch and the Kimana Sanctuary are less than 10 kilometres apart, close to Kimana town, and on the main C102 highway that runs between Email and Oloitokitok, on the Tanzanian border. They are also less that 20 kilometres from the Kimana Gate of Amboseli National Park (ANP).
While KWS have been able to provide the general areas of ‘cyanide tomato’ ‘ground zero’, further specifics are muddled. Various reports appear to indicate that there was one group of five elephants that died first but the location was not specified. These carcasses were too decomposed and scavenged to establish a cause of death. But there was a second group of 10 elephants that are reported to have died over a two day span but the actual date of this discovery has also not been specified. This lack of clarity presents the perception that the 15 elephants perhaps died spread out over the course of the 30 days, which was not the case. The ambiguity over dates is significant as it was during this time frame that KWS reneged on a payment of over 1 billion Kenya shillings (USD 8 million) to Kajiado County. The elephant deaths occurred in Kajiado County.
The ambiguities continue over the toxin tests. DG Kanga told the world that preliminary tests conducted by the University of Nairobi on samples from the 15 dead elephants showed traces of cyanide. But earlier reports stated that the first five elephants were too decomposed to establish a cause of death. Other reports referred to test results from several elephants. Do 15 elephants, or even 10, constitute several? In addition, Kenya News Broadcasting reported that test samples had also been sent to “the Government Chemist and other specialized laboratories for toxicology and pathological testing……preliminary tests by the Government Chemist did not detect the toxic substances.” The discrepancy between test results has never been explained. Did KWS take the results they wanted to craft their explanation? And who are these other specialised labs?
And then there are ambiguities in statements from different spokespersons within KWS. The KWS communications Director, Duncan Wanyama, told Mongabay that some of the poisoned elephants had GPS tracking devises and that their lack of movement alerted authorities to their deaths. If that was the case, would there not be a more exact to time of death as well as evidence as to where the cyanide tomatoes were ingested? It was also Wanyama who advised of the negative results from the Government Chemist tests.
In two different interviews, Head of Veterinary and Capture Services, Dr. Isaac Lekoolol, stated that the stomach contents of one of six elephants that roamed Kimana sanctuary included “lots of tomatoes, suggesting agrochemical poisoning”. Whether through editing or otherwise, it was not clear if the other five elephants had also had eaten tomatoes or whether they were being grouped together in the testing as part of the same family. In the same news clip, DG Kanga also referred to the six elephants. Were these the original five deceased elephants now increased to six or part of the second group? DG Kanga and Dr. Lekoolol both cautioned at the time that if the contamination became widespread there would be consequences for other livestock in the area and “if this (cyanide) is truly what is in the system, then we are going to see a bigger impact.” 24 hours later, the whole affair had become an isolated incident.
Which brings us to the narrative most likely aligned with the truth as to how and why the elephants died. In the Daily Nation article, “The Untold Story In Cyanide Poisoning of 15 Amboseli Elephants”, (re-created below) published just hours after DG Kanga went on television, it was reported that the elephant deaths were likely due to a chain of events precipitated by the actions, actually inactions, of KWS.
The report surmises that at least 15 elephants were likely dead because the KWS reneged on a payment of over 1 billion shillings (USD 8 million) to Kajiado County that was due as part of an Amboseli National Park (ANP) transition agreement. As per that transition implementation framework, endorsed by President Ruto, control and management of ANP was to transition from KWS to Kajiado County over a three year period. This included an agreed first year remittance by KWS to Kajiado County of 50% of ANP’s revenue’s gate receipts by July 1st, 2026. Annual gate receipts are approximately three billion shillings. KWS released not one shilling.
Needless to say, an expected but missing 1 billion shilling payment, frayed some Kajiado County nerves and the situation escalated to the point that a number of Maasai group ranchers threatened and planned a physical takeover of ANP. It was reported that Maa leaders in the area mobilised supporters to physically take over the park until a personal phone call from President Ruto to Kajiado County Governor, Jospeh Ole Lenku, reportedly calmed the waters ( the transition process is presently pending a court hearing.)
The Nation article provided three anonymous sources with information and suggestions that the deaths were a “well orchestrated plan” from outsiders linked to the transition process, that the poisoning was intentional and not from farmers, and that the deaths were meant to send a message to KWS.
There has been a KWS emphasis on the fact that Kimana is a top tomato growing region of Kenya. A 2024 article in ‘The Route to Food’ by James Njuguna, co-founder of Center for Rangelands Management, did identify that some farms in the area had been found using a pesticide whose active ingredient included cyanide. While the article stated that the cyanide was toxic to humans, it did not specify if it was of a strength to kill livestock or larger. The article also mentioned that they were re-educating the same farmers to follow agroecological techniques.
There are 47 counties in Kenya. 38 of them grow tomatoes. 38 of them also have elephants. Would KWS have us believe that this random, never happened before tragedy, occurred by complete chance in Kajiado County, less than 15 kilometres from ANP’s main gate, within days of KWS’s refusal to pay over 1 billion shillings to Kajiado County?
An organisation that sees itself as beyond public accountability has sloughed off an investigation that is clearly in their realm. All the facts presented, ambiguous as they are, indicate human-wildlife conflict. It may have been accidental but there has been no investigation to reach that conclusion. KWS has not presented critical details of which they have knowledge that would have made their explanation credible, the toxicity results are contradictory, and statements are ambiguous and changing dependent on the media source spoken to.
15 elephants, if that is the accurate number, are dead; scapegoats to the dispute between KWS and Kajiado County. KWS needed to classify the elephant deaths as accidental to negate their requirement to investigate, extricate themselves from blame, and to alleviate public concerns that order was restored. There is even a high probability that KWS know the elephant deaths, however they were caused, came from the hands of those affected by the failed remittance, enabling DG Kanga to confidently report to the public that it was an isolated incident.
This tragedy has been relegated to inquiry by committee of the Pest Control Products Board.
To laugh or to cry?
The untold story in cyanide poisoning of 15 Amboseli elephants | Daily Nation
By Stanley Ngotho Nation Media Group
